Opening of the Festival Exhibition: Knut Åsdam – Murmansk/Kirkenes

Knut Åsdam’s new film Murmansk/Kirkenes is an experimental, medium length fiction shot on location in the border region between Norway and Russia – a region receiving increasing attention due to ice melting and rich oil and fish resources. Simultaneously, this is an area of great political tension where NATO meets Russia and whose history is closely linked to Europe’s destiny.

The film is split into three parts. In the first section, we meet two female border guards patrolling the border landscape whilst they search for something unusual and disturbing. Then we follow a character-driven story that takes place between the roadhouse café of Titovka and the arctic city of Murmansk – everyday life of two women and their relation to their job, place and each other. In the final section, the film comes full circle, returning to the border landscape from where it began.